The process of dry-cleaning garments does not end with the actual dry-cleaning of the garment. That is, after the garment has been dry-cleaned, it must be pressed. Garment pressing is performed by "steaming" the garment so that it can be neatly pressed with minimal wrinkling. To optimally steam a garment's sleeves or pant-legs, steam must be injected and held therein. However, the devices most widely used in the industry fail to hold steam within the sleeves and pant-legs long enough to provide optimum pressing conditions. Furthermore, these devices often serve to mis-shape the garments' sleeves and pant-legs due to the bulkiness of the devices.
Past devices employed for expanding garment sleeves or pant-legs for performing the pressing associated with dry-cleaning of garments include the one depicted in FIG. 1, in which two elongated wooden rods 1 are connected by a spring 2 disposed therein between. To employ the device of FIG. 1 in the steaming operation for a garment, the spring 2 is compressed by forcing the wooden rods 1 towards each other, the device is inserted into the garment sleeve or pant-leg, and then the spring is allowed to expand, thus opening the sleeve or pant-leg to allow steam to pass through. However, this device is disadvantageous in that there is no barrier provided, thereby allowing steam to pass through the sleeve or pant-leg uninhibited. Thus the cleaning/pressing quality of the garment is reduced. Further, the device disfigures garments in which it is utilized since there is no way to contour such a device to accommodate the interior contour of the sleeve or pant-leg, as seen in FIG. 1B.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,015,422 describes a sleeve tool in which one end of two opposing arms are connected by a spring which urges the free ends of the arms apart. The sleeve tool is inserted into the garment sleeve by compressing the spring by forcing the free ends of the arms towards each other. The spring is then allowed to expand once the free ends of the arms are within the sleeve. Excessive expansion of the spring, and the sleeve as well, is prevented by a fabric strap which is attached to the distal ends of each of the free arms. However, because of the shape of the arms, the garment is disfigured. Also, although the strap may absorb a small amount of steam within the sleeve or pant-leg, practical application shows that a mere strip of fabric does not sufficiently impede the loss of steam from the sleeve or pant-leg to provide optimum pressing conditions.